


Broken Strings

by TwistedVirtues



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Age Difference, M/M, Red String of Fate, Swearing, a boat load of insecurities and self doubt on Mako's part, unnamed character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-26
Updated: 2018-11-26
Packaged: 2019-08-29 18:47:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,286
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16749619
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TwistedVirtues/pseuds/TwistedVirtues
Summary: Destiny has a funny way of guiding people but Mako Rutledge never believed in such nonsense like The Red String of Fate. For twenty three years he never saw a trace of it till one day he woke up and there it was. Such a shame life is never simple though.





	Broken Strings

**Author's Note:**

> This is longer than I expected it to be. The idea was simple and the more I kept going the more things just kept falling into place.  
> I hope this is worth your time!

The red string of fate was such an idiotic fairytale. For years Mako Rutledge scoffed at the people around him who claimed to have such a thing. A thin red string of fate that was tied to the finger of some other love crazed fool, tying them together till one day they could fatedly meet. What a load of Grade A bullshit. 

At least he had always thought it to be and how could he believe in such tripe? He had never seen such a thing and everyone else claimed it was invisible to everyone but themselves and their destined. An invisible, red string. How could it be invisible but colored? The whole thing was a messed up load of bologna. It had to be. Even if the whole town buzzed about having such a thing. Hell, the whole world seemed to be on about it. What idiots. Mako was never going to fall for such a half cocked story. Never.  
Perhaps that was why he was fine being alone. No one ever claimed a string lead them to him and if he was being honest with himself, he didn’t want a partner that was crazy enough to believe in that garbage. The world could keep their fairytale happily ever afters.

But one day Mako woke up with a weary yawn. His meaty hands rubbing the sleep from his eyes before he stretched his arms over his head and gradually registering he was awake. That was when he first noticed something was off. There around his pinky finger was a thin red line. It was so small and he had overlooked it at first but now he could see it a little clearer and the damn thing wrapped all the way around. It was most peculiar. 

Shrugging it off, Mako rose to his feet and headed to the bathroom where he would properly begin starting his day with a quick hot shower. Reaching for the tap he paused and thought himself to still be tired when his grey eyes briefly glimpsed the red ringlet once more. Perhaps he managed to sleep on his hand and it merely made a strange red indent that would fade away. Something else to shrug off and so he did.

But it remained. The small circlet stayed around his pinky and only when he had gone to change into clothes after his shower had he the mind to examine it. Upon further inspection he saw that it was clearly not a minor impression from sleeping in his bed awkwardly but it looked more like a piece of thin yarn complete with a tiny little knot and bow that rested just on the outer side of his finger.

A prank. It had to be. But by who, Mako could not even begin to guess. What kind of idiot would have the audacity to try and prank him? No one came to mind but there was no way this was anything else but a sick joke. Determined to be rid of it and end it without much fuss, he had finished getting dressed only to head into the kitchen and get a knife. He would be rid of it and then make himself some breakfast and that would be the end of it.

At least, that had been the plan. Unfortunately for Mako, the knife was not cutting through the string. If anything it seemed to go through it as if it were a hologram. He gave an indignant huff and tried again only to get frustrated and try once more. The blade cutting him shallowly but not the red string. 

What was this bullshit? Mako grunted in annoyance as he went to his sink and began to wash away the small bit of blood his accidental self inflicted cut caused. The string however appeared to be dry and remain so even when Mako proceeded to wash both hands. 

This was insane, he thought to himself. He was twenty three years old and now he was seeing things? Strings of fate? Ha- he was surely going mad. Besides. This idiotic thing lead him nowhere. It merely wrapped around his own pinky. What kind of destiny would show up to confirm his own unspoken thoughts that he was going to remain alone all his life? He had come to accept it a few years ago and now this? No. No way! He was not going to have any of it.

And so Mako Rutledge dried his hands before trying a more sensible approach. Two fingers pinching at the little bit of yarn that looked more like fine thread against his bulk, and pulled at the end piece. The infernal string however not budging a hair. He tried again with no further result. There was only one thing he could do then and so Mako went on ignoring the string. 

Sure there were a few times he caught himself late at night looking it over but he usually dismissed it again with a grunt and was able to hide it fairly effortlessly with a ring. It was a quick and easy enough solution to forget about the string this way.

But fate did not want to be ignored. The red string felt like it had grown longer overnight. It had actually been nearly year and now it appeared it was beginning to fray. Good, Mako thought. Maybe it would fray away and fall off on it’s own. 

The red string however turned out not to be fraying. Instead it was getting longer. It was strange and getting more difficult to hide behind a ring. No one else seemed to notice it though. It was getting infuriating and as the months bled into years, the cursed string only seemed to be getting longer but it still lead to nothing and no one.

Growing more annoyed and desperate Mako took to wrapping the thread loosely around his own hand and wearing gloves. For some reason he could touch it and move it but not remove the vile sight. And for years, although it irked him when he needed to wash up or remove his glove for anything, it was gone and out of sight as best as he could get it. A constant trial that became almost a downright irritating ritual in the morning of just wrapping it around and around then capping it off with a fingerless glove that just rose high enough to hide where the damn string was attached. 

But the red string still grew in length. Eighteen years had passed since Mako Rutledge initially found it and he had to become creative over that time. The glove trick worked for five years. The next five marking his tenth year he had it coiled around his bulky arm where it felt as if he had been bandaging himself up in the most inefficient way. After that there was just too much and he was too tired to keep up his ritual of hiding the red string from sight. 

On a whim he had left it alone and found it seemed not to ever truly get in his way. It was just a constant visual reminder that this made up myth was just as asinine as ever. Strings. Fate. It was all nonsense surely but Mako finally had one. He could actually see it and although it took him a long time to even get one he managed to find himself wondering for the first time about something everyone else seemed to think about when they were but children. Just what kind of partner did fate actually have in mind for him?

Perhaps she would be big like him. Maybe she would want kids. Hopefully not. Would it even be a woman on the other side? The thought was so jarring it made Mako laugh to his core. Look at him. Thinking about romance for the first time since grade school! What a sap he had become. A smile graced his lips for once as he rubbed the red string between two fingers on his other hand and for the first time had finally noticed that it now lead out into the distance. Perhaps this whole thing wasn’t too stupid after all.

But then war crept in. The sky itself turned sour and thick with darkness. Mako had found himself forgetting about the silly string. This was more important. The future was at stake and before anyone could fully grasp just what had happened, their world had been blown apart. Everything was torn from them and Mako’s world went into a terribly blinding white light.

Mako woke up bandaged in a cot far too small for his bulk. His muscles and back stiff from it as he sat up despite the protesting from a nurse that came to check on him and the guy the next cot over. The rebel man’s face was so bandaged up Mako had no idea just which one of his raiding buddies it had been. 

Raiding- right. The omnium raid. The whole thing blew up in a way none of them had prepared for. 

“Please. Sit back,” the nurse begged and with a gentle push that did nothing she tried to coax Mako to rest with more words but they were all falling on deaf ears when he noticed something. The red string tied to his pinky that previously stretched out into the outback and beyond was once again only a meager seven centimeters. The end of it frayed and hanging limply before his eyes.

Mako could see from his peripheral vision that the nurse was still talking at him but he heard nothing but the ringing white noise that soon flooded his ears. His whole body that had previously ached now felt so numb and his heart had dropped down into the pit of his stomach. His string of fate had been broken and it seemed he had finally managed to sever it. Not with any blade but with an Earth rattling explosion. Just when he had finally began to start having a little hope for himself, Mako then realized, he had sabotaged his own chance at fated love. 

It did not take long for a coldness to settle in his heart where hope had previously began to bloom. Mako had changed and felt the bitter sting of a lost love he never even got to meet or know and while he felt it was his own fault, it was just easier to blame the omnics for this sudden change. In fact, the way he saw things now had began to warp and soon he had come to not even recognize himself when he had been allowed to return to his home. His house a mess and barely standing and thorough a broken window he saw his own reflection and knew. Mako Rutledge was dead. 

Taking his time, he began to rebuild his ruined home into something livable. It was a shadow of its former glory but then again so was the man he could see in the pieces of shattered glass he finally managed to sweep up into one corner. If Mako Rutledge was dead then he needed a new name for himself. This would be his new challenge. His new fate. No longer Mako Rutledge, he would rise from the ashes as the cold hearted-

Cold hearted what? Broad shoulders sunk slightly as no name came to mind. That was fine for now. He would come up with something as the world around him would slowly start to rebuild itself too. This was how it was to be. No fate. Just humanity trying to scrape by and survive with the results of a hopeless loser who died when the omnium blew. He was a survivor and fate had nothing to do with it.

And just as he wanted, the man once known as Mako had made himself known to the town that popped up in the distance. A shabby decaying place called Junkertown. A place just made with the remaining scrap and debris the survivors there could work with and forge into something that provided shelter from the blistering sun. A vile little hellhole where people who called themselves Junkers did not thrive but survived with their wits, cruelty, and misplaced trust in the one they called The Queen. It was here where he traded supplies to bring home and earned his new name: Roadhog.

He liked the name despite how he earned it. The bar keep fascinated by his motorcycle he would ride into the town and how the stranger could fit on top of it and hog most of the nonexistent road. Perhaps it was not an initially kind name but fuck it. Roadhog was not a kind person. If anything he was sure he was the polar opposite and perhaps that was what initially brought him a mild interest in Junkertown’s arena called The Scrapyard.

Roadhog had learned of the games through the barkeep he often traded with the most. Junk for canisters to replace his old used up or damaged ones for the mask he now wore. Another motif that most definitely helped to shape the new name he now proudly wore. 

The Scrapeyard games were brutal. There no one cared about the safety of each other. In fact, the more blood drawn the more the crowed cheered. Roadhog swore he even saw a woman rip a man’s spine clean from his back. The shower of gore earning a deep growl of praise from the crowd and himself. Only then he had noticed something he had all but forgotten. The thin circlet of red string that just managed to draw his attention away from the chaos. 

Roadhog huffed after a grand moment of silence. No one here in Junkertown talked of soulmates or red strings. The world had changed since he and his old team blown Australia sky high. Here it was everyone for themselves. Had they all lost their destined ones? Did it even matter? Had such a thing ever truly been real? It was all difficult to keep track of and honestly Roadhog did not want a single thing to do with it any more. He wanted to forget about it all so perhaps that was why he did the unthinkable and signed up for the next Scrapyard games.

Before he knew it all of Junkertown had learned his name. Roadhog was quickly climbing ranks and the crowd loved him. The cheer of everyone on their feet and stomping was like listening to the roaring ocean crashing into the cliff side of his childhood home and gave him peace he never thought he could get back. Everyone loved him with the exception of his opponents. Many he killed until the rules were changed to allow maiming but no life taking. A revision by The Queen if only to keep the numbers of her rusty old town from dwindling into nothing. But it hardly mattered. The violent outlet was really all Roadhog needed. That and the cheers that so desperately tried to rekindle something inside him. 

Then a new stranger came to town. The man never seen in person but his mechanical suit was impressive and yet so cheap. The thick layers of metal practically making the man invincible and even Roadhog had trouble taking him down. This damnable Wrecking Ball. A proper name for the challenger and try as he might Roadhog just could not seem to get through that armor to the man inside. The result having him drop from the games as the embers that once made him feel like he might be alive still were growing cold once again. And so he went back to just visiting the town for beer and supplies. The Queen upset her number two in battle refused to reconsider his leave. Roadhog’s reign of two years had come and went but the games went one without him just as he knew they would.

Having mainly lost track of time, Roadhog merely took each new day in stride. The few idiots that tried to raid his land were easily displaced and buried out back. Only recently had he lost the spark of joy in blood and let the last set of trespassers go. Why kill them when all they would do is remind him that red was such a temporary color. They were but youths anyway and would not get far in life or in travel and that was fine. That was just how things were now. 

The word fate briefly crossed Roadhog’s mind and he felt a bitterness fill his mouth. Perhaps now was as good as time as any to visit the bar. Roadhog then grabbed an old sack and began to fill it with scrap to exchange and went out to where he stored his bike. Mercifully those damn Junkers had not managed to find and tear it apart before he found them. 

The ride into town was quiet. The town itself though buzzed with chatter. Everyone talking about nothing and Roadhog found it easy enough to ignore. That was until he managed to get to the bar itself. The keeper friendly enough as usual but seemingly having an off day while some chatter box bragged loudly in the corner. The voice high and grating. It was going to take more than a few beers to rid him of the terrible noise.

Roadhog took a seat and with one hand pushed his mask up high enough to be able to drink. The eye holes of his mask just large enough to still not obstruct his view as he drank deeply only to near choke when shrill laughter reverberated in the air. The noise luckily short lived and he was able to finish his first drink. The large glass clinking on the counter top and Roadhog motioned for another. If this was going to keep up then he doubted he would be able to stay much longer.

“Hey there handsome!” Roadhog hardly noticed the seat beside him fill with someone till they spoke again. “Oh wow, you are so much bigger up close! I love it!” 

Shifting his gaze but still facing the bar, Roadhog realized the terrible voice from before had to belong to this man. The bloke was near skin and bones with a smile just brimming with sharp teeth. 

“You’re Roadhog, right? I used to watch you fight in the Scrapyard! What a machine! Well, not as much of a machine as Wrecking Ball o’ course! But then again, who is? Ha!” 

Roadhog said nothing in hopes the other might take the hint and leave him in peace. His second beer hardly touched but he rose it to his lips anyway and took a swig. 

“I haven't seen you around much of late. With Wrecking Ball taking off like he did I reckon you could easily jump back in as unopposed champion! I mean if you want to of course.” The stranger did not appear to take his hint to get lost but rather as an invitation to fill the silence with his own yammering. “I just can’t believe it, you know? Me sitting here and talking with you of all people! It’s like a dream! I mean it’s not quite as impressive as the treasure I’ve found but like this is the next best thing, that is for sure!” 

Treasure? This guy was clearly delusional or did not adhere to the rules of this town. All loot was to handed over to The Queen and rationed as she saw fit. It was just one of the few rules this awful town had but Roadhog could hardly bring himself to care.

“Bet you are wondering just what it is I found, eh?”

Turning to face away, Roadhog tilted his head back more to try and down his drink only to nearly jump when the blonde man popped up into view on his other side. Mouth spread into an impossibly wide grin that showed a glimmering gold tooth. From here Roadhog noticed that was not the only thing the stranger had to replace. Two limbs both on the same side and surprisingly bigger than the odd man’s own limbs that remained. 

“I tell ya, what I found is easily worth twice, no, five times what the stupid Queen has!” The stranger laughed only to cock his head sharply to one side and blink. “Hold up,” he muttered only to further invade Roadhog’s space and scrunch up his nose as he leaned closer then back all of a sudden. “What a strange thing to have! I haven’t seen anyone wear such a thing since- since,” the junker snapped his mechanical fingers several times only to wave the thought off with his same hand. “Well, since I lost this.”

“What?” Roadhog spoke only to instantly regret saying anything at all. 

“That!” A metal finger pointed out to his hand holding the handle of his beer glass. 

“Beer?”

“No, no! That!” He pointed again with more enthusiasm and a faint touch of laughter. “That little bit of string. I used to have one like it. Was an odd thing, tell you what. Was wrapped around my finger for the longest time and I swear it lead off out into nowhere before the Big Boom. Lost it after that along with, well, half of myself but whatever. Actually, come to think of it, that sounds pretty dumb right? Red string that just leads off into nowhere. Ha! Oh, it musta been something I dreampt up as a kid. Funny though right?”

Roadhog had sat his glass down but held onto it as the other rambled. His words clear but the tone before he dismissed himself as having imagined it sounded real and what made it all the stranger was how, for the first time ever, someone else could see the string. The same red string that drove him batty for the past twenty five years. 

“You,” Roadhog’s mouth suddenly felt dry. “Can see it?”

The chatty junker sniffed only to realize he had been asked a question. Not just that but Roadhog himself was actually talking with him! Him! It was just a shame he missed what he had said. “Run that by me again?”

This was stupid. He should leave it alone. Leave the bar. Head home. Forget everything about this day and just move on like nothing happened. But he could feel it. For the first time in a while Roadhog felt sick and like something inside him was bouncing around in his rib cage and making his mind feel hazy. “You can see the string?”

Roadhog watched as the other gave a snort and placed his elbows on the table with his hands lacing together as he leaned forward to support himself. 

“Course I can, mate! The damn thing is red as a sunset! Would have to be blind not to see it. Name’s Junk-”

“Junkrat, leave my patrons alone!” The barkeep spoke up. The blonde laughing nervously as he straightened himself up from the bar. “And pay your damn tab!”

“Hold on! I’m good on the money. I swear it! Here.”

The rest of the conversation fading into the background as Roadhog began to stare down for the first time in a long while at the tattered string. Ancient words from the past softly coming to him as he recalled others saying how they too had red strings that no one else could see. No one except their destined partners to be. Was this- surely not. And yet no one else had ever been able to see his string. No one till now and this stranger, this, what had the barkeep called him? The name not clicking into place as Roadhog breathed a little deeper trying to keep himself together and his mind from racing any further. 

The strange blonde said he had a string like it. One he had before he lost his arm. One that possibly was- This was all too much and while Roadhog desperately wanted to dash out and leave this madness behind something shook him. Something in his gut wanted him to know the truth and maybe it was dumb. Maybe he was being beyond foolish but he need to know and if it wasn’t what he suspected it might be then he would let it go. 

“Sorry about him,” the barkeep spoke suddenly. His words cutting through Roadhog’s thoughts and bringing him back to reality. “He won’t be bothering you anymore.”

“What?” 

“I sent him further in back. Wasn’t actually expecting him to be able to pay his tab though. Wonder who he swindled for the cash.” The barkeep finished polishing up his glass though it still looked just as smudged and grimy as all the others. 

“You know him?”

“Look at you being Mr. Talkative.” The frown that crossed Roadhog’s mouth enough to steer the conversation back onto course. “Yeah, I know him. Goes by the name Junkrat. He’s a compulsive liar but then again who isn’t in this town? I’m surprised you haven’t heard of him before. He’s not exactly on The Queen’s good side. I’m pretty sure he is just one step away from being killed or exiled.” Either way it was a death warrant for him. 

...Junkrat? An odd name but now that he was thinking about it he had heard it spoken once or twice before. Usually in passing and it was never spoken kindly. 

“Junkrat,” Roadhog murmured before noticing he had been given a third beer. 

“This one is on the house.”

“Thanks,” was all Roadhog could muster. It took a lot of willpower not to turn around and look the man over again. Roadhog instead focusing on his beer as his mind tried to wonder only to be cut down as the shrill voice sliced through his thoughts once more. This time it sounded different. Less teasing and coy and more worried and like a plea. The words friend was tossed about along with varying percentages that it took a hot moment for the rest to actually sink in. 

Junkrat was in trouble and begging Roadhog of all people for help. Not just anyone. Him. And this was it. The moment Roadhog could take or leave. Save his possible soul mate or let him and the ridiculous theory die and fade off into nothing so he could live the rest of his days predictably and alone.

Junkrat’s voice raised higher to a near squeak and in that moment Roadhog found his gaze down on his pinky. The little string where it had been for the past twenty five years and the frayed end pointing back behind himself where the plea was coming from. 

In that instant another bar patron slid into view. The man equally as scrawny as Junkrat with a skull ridiculously placed on top of his head. A souvenir he most likely found when scrounging about in the outback for scrap rather then a trophy for a kill he was certain the idiot had not made but thought looked intimidating as a hat. 

“Twenty percent!” Junkrat called. 

“Just sit there like a good little piggy and there’ll be no need to make you squeal,” the skull capped junker chuckled. 

“...Twenty five.”

/Twenty five/ Twenty five years. For twenty five years he had waited and endured hell on Earth even to get this far and he could now finally see and experience what the rest of the people he known before the omnium blew had felt and bragged about. And now these little shitheads where going to take it all away before he even had the chance to even see what it was like? 

Junkrat had been talking percentages but it was the number alone that spurred Roadhog into action. The glass being brought down suddenly onto the bar table with a thunderous crash. Glass and cheap alcohol littering the area as Roadhog rose up from his stool and left the mess behind. He turned to see the same idiot who threatened him now with his filthy pals and circling in around Junkrat, who despite his height looked so small against the gang of junkers that outnumbered him. 

Before he could even think of changing his mind, Roadhog reacted. His fist colliding into the closest offender’s jaw and dislocating it upon impact. He was even certain he saw a tooth fly out from his adrenaline driven punch and before he knew it Roadhog had laid waste to all the junkers who had surrounded Junkrat. The bar itself a mess when his rage began to calm and Roadhog had the need to settle himself with one last drink before taking his leave. 

The red in his vision died down till all was normal. The barkeep had made him a drink only to immediately crouch down out of sight. Seeing Roadhog take out four men in less than a minute was enough to remind him that the man had previously been the champion of the Scrapyard before Wrecking Ball had taken over the scene, and despite Roadhog’s retirement he was still a deadly force to be reckoned with.

“That was amazing!” Junkrat spoke up through the sudden quiet. “I knew it! I knew you looked like a fine, upstanding sort!” The blonde rambling on further only to move up and stand next to the stool Roadhog had returned to. “And that treasure-” Junkrat chuckled nervously only to try and bring down his last percentage he offered. The number that spurred Roadhog to save his life whether he knew it or not. 

Downing his last beer, Roadhog wiped the foam away from his mouth before drawing his mask back down into place. A nice buzz finally taking over where the adrenaline had faded away and just enough to let him think more freely instead of bottling up all his more fantasmic thoughts away. 

He had saved someone. Not just any random someone but someone, if this red string of destiny stuff was to be believed, who had been chosen to be his partner. A man he would have never guessed or even considered on his own who was still yammering at the mouth. The very idea of that just comical enough to make the big man smile under his mask. 

“Fifty.”

“What?” Junkrat paused in his yapping only to step back as Roadhog rose to his feet to take his leave. 

“Fifty percent,” Roadhog clarified. After all, if this man was his fated love then everything they were going to do from now on was going to be fifty-fifty.

“Fifty? That’s a good one. Best I can do is thir- er, twenty five.” 

There was that number again. 

“You drive a hard bargain, mate. Twenty eight!” 

Roadhog said nothing but rolled his eyes. So this was the kind of partner the red string of fate gifted him? 

“Fine!” Junkrat called. His arms up in the air over his head in mock exasperation. “Fifty percent and that’s my final offer!” 

Junkrat was not the quiet type, that was for sure but perhaps that was what he was missing. What the world was missing. What /his/ world had been missing. And maybe this wasn’t so bad. Hell, perhaps Roadhog was finally getting what he deserved and if anyone wanted to take this away from him they were not going to get to live long to regret it. The world deserved them and Roadhog had a feeling that this was the start of something more. What, he was not fully certain himself but whatever this was, the world was never going to forget the day Junkrat and Roadhog finally found one another.

**Author's Note:**

> Apologies to anyone expecting an update on Moira's New Labrat. I swear that is still in the works but I just felt the compulsive need to write this first.


End file.
